Part 3 was released some time back and I apologize for not posting that. See the end of this post to see details on the release and wrap party for the final episode. Have you heard about this new podcast? Sponsored by the Delaware Center for Justice, this is a long-form reporting project that is meant to explore the role that poverty plays in Wilmington’s crime problems. This will be in four parts — and so far includes voices from young men wrapped up in crime as well as voices from the ACLU, Dr. Yasser Payne, Charlie Copeland and others who are illuminating the larger picture involved with Wilmington’s crime problems. I’ve listened to the first one (this is about 20 minutes long) and it is riveting — Wilmington’s own Serial. Give it a listen and I hope you’ll come back to this thread to discuss this work and the issues it raises.

I am told this is also on iTunes and you can also add this to your podcast app by grabbing this RSS feed:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/murdertown

The final episode will be released and played Live at The Queen, where you can discuss this series, what it means for Wilmington and potential solutions on August 4 at 6pm. If you want to go, RSVP here. Hope to see you there!

The featured image attached to this post is from the murdertown.us website.

Comments (9)

Thank you so much for posting this! Please put up the next one when it’s released.

If you care about poverty you need to listen to this. If we care or comment on poverty or the city, listening to this should be required.

As a city resident, the comments at the beginning weren’t surprising.

I’ve known, and worked with, kids like Ricky. They are great kids who we, as a society, have written off. A friend told me how she watched a child dump out a box of cereal on the table. When asked why, the child said, “You have to look for the roaches before you eat.” Heartbreaking.

The “provider” segment is eye-opening. We’ve really become comfortable in our stereotypes.

Everyone please listen to these. I just finished the second one. Amazing series. Charlie Copeland might not have solutions*, but he understands the problems. (*So far this series is explaining what’s going on)

One of the most frustrating things is how disconnected we are as a society. These children’s problems/situations are our problems.

Quite an emotional cliffhanger at the end of this episode… a great deal to reflect upon ahead of next week’s. Summary of this episode in one quote:

“If you’re poor or you’re brown you’re more likely to have contact with the police. And then, once that contact starts, at every stage having money is a get-out-of-jail card, and not having money is a stay-in-jail card.” –Ryan Tack-Hooper, ACLU DE

And once your there, as the kid said on the way to the Howard basketball game, there’s no beating this shit.

On a tangential note, I saw Bryan Stevenson (First State native!) on PBS Newshour last week discussing these topics. I think the context was a stay of execution for a man with significant deficiencies in mental capacity in Alabama (where Mr Stevenson’s organization is headquartered). The work Mr Stevenson does makes me proud to be a Delawarean. I met him and listened to a talk he gave about a year ago here in Wilmington. It’s powerful stuff. If you aren’t familiar with his work at the Equal Justice Initiative:

Thanks, again for getting Zach’s work produced and disseminated. This is so immensely important. We’ve painted ourselves into an extremely ugly corner and we need to work our way out somehow. We’ll never realize any sustainable economic or social progress if we continue to lug around the weight of the criminal justice fiasco we created.

“If you’re poor or you’re brown you’re more likely to have contact with the police. And then, once that contact starts, at every stage having money is a get-out-of-jail card, and not having money is a stay-in-jail card.” –Ryan Tack-Hooper, ACLU DE

That jumped out at me, too. Along with the fact they weren’t allowed to live with their parents after their release because their parents lived in public housing – and that’s not allowed in public housing. So they moved from couch to couch which meant they had no steady address and that violated their probation.